Secondary Schools Curriculum and Staffing Survey

Baroness Gould of Potternewton: asked Her Majesty's Government:
	When the results of the Secondary Schools Curriculum and Staffing Survey will be published.

Baroness Ashton of Upholland: In November 2002, my department conducted a Secondary Schools Curriculum and Staffing Survey. The last was held in November 1996. This survey is a periodic voluntary sample survey of maintained secondary schools in England intended to provide data on the breadth of curriculum offered by schools to different year groups, and the post-A level qualifications held by teachers at these schools and how these relate to the subjects that they teach. I informed noble Lords on 7 February 2002 (col. 733) that it was our intention to publish the results of the survey during the first half of 2003. Accordingly, provisional results from this survey have been scheduled for publication as national statistics on 16 April 2003, with final results due to be published in September.
	Over 800 schools were invited to take part in the survey and, to date, 174 positive responses have been received. Professional advice from officials of the Government Statistical Service is that, while this response provides sufficient data to allow representative results on curriculum coverage to be obtained, there are insufficient data to allow representative results on teachers' qualifications to be obtained at this point. This advice has been given to me in accordance with the national statistics code of practice, which also means that no results from any part of the survey have yet been disclosed to Ministers or policy officials of my department.
	Despite the survey form being designed to impose minimum burdens on participating schools, the response rate has been lower than anticipated. This is due to the voluntary nature of the survey. Government statisticians have made intensive efforts to support and encourage respondents and these efforts are meeting with some success. The department will continue to make these efforts and to take all possible action to increase positive responses from schools in order to yield sufficient data on teachers' qualifications.
	In view of these facts, I am advised that provisional results on curriculum coverage only will be included in the publication scheduled for 16 April 2003. It is now my department's intention to include results on teachers' qualifications in the release of final data scheduled for September 2003, when sufficient data have been secured.

Teacher Training

Lord Desai: asked Her Majesty's Government:
	How many people have applied for courses of initial teacher training in the 2003–04 academic year.

Baroness Ashton of Upholland: Figures published by the Graduate Teacher Training Registry on 2 April show that, up to 22 March, 34,013 people had applied for places on postgraduate courses of initial teacher training at institutions in England in 2003–04. That is a 16 per cent rise on the same point in last year's recruitment cycle, when 29,445 applications had been received. These figures include increases of 25 per cent in the number of applicants to train in mathematics; 12 per cent to train in science; 3 per cent to train in modern languages; 10 per cent to train in English; and 40 per cent to train in technology.
	Recruitment to courses of initial teacher training fell for eight successive years from 1992–93. Following the introduction of teacher training bursaries and golden hello incentives, it has risen in each of the past three years. Applications for training in 2003–04 will continue to be processed until the autumn, and final recruitment figures are expected to be published in November.

Neighbourhood Renewal Fund

Baroness Pitkeathley: asked Her Majesty's Government:
	What plans they have for allocating the additional £975 million Neighbourhood Renewal Fund resources that were made available in the spending review 2002.

Lord Rooker: As part of the spending review 2002, the Government announced that they would be making available an additional £975 million for the Neighbourhood Renewal Fund (NRF) in 2004–05 and 2005–06 as part of their strategy to revitalise England's poorest neighbourhoods and create places where people want to live, not leave.
	We have already provided £900 million of NRF to the 88 most deprived local authority areas for the period 2001–02 to 2003–04. Already, good progress has been made by local authorities in collaboration with local strategic partnerships in using NRF to help address some of the most serious problems in our most deprived neighbourhoods.
	However, more needs to be done, particularly to support better tailoring and targeting of mainstream services to make sure that they are reaching the people and places which need them most. To achieve this, we are committed to ensuring that these areas continue to receive both the resources and other forms of support needed to tackle postcode poverty and create thriving, sustainable communities.
	That is why we are announcing today that we intend to use most of these additional NRF resources to continue funding the current 88 eligible local authority areas in 2004–05 and 2005–06 at the 2003–04 level. This will mean an additional £800 million over the two-year period. We will confirm detailed figures of the allocations to individual local authorities shortly.
	Engaging the community in the process of neighbourhood renewal is central to the National Strategy for Neighbourhood Renewal. We are therefore also announcing today that we intend to provide an additional £86 million over the same period to support community participation programmes in the current 88 eligible areas for NRF.
	There remains £175 million of additional NRF resources still to be allocated. I will inform the House shortly on how we intend to distribute these.

Human Diploid Cells

Earl Howe: asked Her Majesty's Government:
	Whether the use of human diploid cells originating from human aborted foetal tissue as a medium for vaccines is subject to donor consent; how much such tissue is used in this way each year; and what commercial arrangements exist between the National Health Service and pharmaceutical companies to facilitate its availability for this use.

Baroness Andrews: The human diploid cell line (called MRC-5) used in the production of some vaccines (rubella, rabies, hepatitis A and some polio vaccines) was derived from one sample of foetal lung tissue obtained following a termination of a pregnancy for medical reasons in 1966. No further foetal tissue has been obtained. There is no commercial arrangement between the National Health Service and pharmaceutical companies to facilitate the availability of this cell line. The National Institute for Biological Standards and Control maintains a limited stock of the MRC-5 cell line and over the past 20 years has distributed small samples of this stock free of charge to pharmaceutical companies for the production of vaccines. The companies have then used these as "seeds" to develop their own stocks of MRC-5 cells for full-scale vaccine production.

Transfusion-related Acute Lung Injury

Lord Clement-Jones: asked Her Majesty's Government:
	How many cases of transfusion-related acute lung injury in the past five years have been caused by fresh frozen plasma.

Baroness Andrews: The UK Serious Hazards of Transfusion (SHOT) reporting system provides data on transfusion-related acute lung injury (TRALI). However TRALI is difficult to diagnose and fresh frozen plasma (FFP) is just one blood component that has been seen to cause reactions which may be or may not have resulted in TRALI.
	
		
			 Year *Number of TRALI cases initially reported to SHOT **Number of TRALI cases shown in completed returns ***Number of TRALI cases where FFP was the blood component implicated 
			 1996–97 11 9 2 
			 1997–98 16 14 3 
			 1998–99 16 16 7 
			 1999–2000 19 18 3 
			 2000–01 15 13 4 
			 *Number of cases initially reported to SHOT showing an intention to report an incidence of TRALI. 
			 **Number of completed questionnaires received by SHOT showing TRALI cases. 
			 *** Number of cases where FFP is the suspected cause to varying degrees of probability. FFP is often used in conjunction with other blood components and it is not always possible to determine which component may have been the cause.

Transfusion-related Acute Lung Injury

Lord Clement-Jones: asked Her Majesty's Government:
	Whether they or the National Blood Service have provided financial settlement in any case of transfusion-related acute lung injury; and, if so, what level of settlement has been made; and
	Whether they have assessed the cost of possible compensation claims from transfusion-related lung injury; and how they plan to budget for this.

Baroness Andrews: The National Blood Service has made a settlement out of court in one case of transfusion-related acute lung injury (TRALI). The case was settled for £25,000 plus costs.
	No specific assessment has been made of the possible compensation claims for TRALI. However, on 21 March 2003 the National Audit Office (NAO) published its assessment of provision needed by the National Health Service to cover current and anticipated clinical negligence claims. The amount estimated in 2001–02 was £5.25 billion. In coming to this calculation the NAO has looked at the numbers of actual claims and the numbers of incidents that have been incurred but not yet reported. (NHS (England) Summarised Accounts 2001–02 www.nao.gov.uk)

Hospitality Industry: Smoking Policy

Baroness Gale: asked Her Majesty's Government:
	What consideration they have given, during their discussions with the hospitality industry about the introduction of a public places charter on passive smoking, to any evidence on the effectiveness or otherwise of the protection given against the health hazards of second-hand smoke by ventilation and air cleaning.

Baroness Andrews: Completely smoke-free places are the ideal and we support those businesses which have decided to take that route. We recognise, however, that this is not always going to be possible and we have therefore entered into the agreement with the hospitality industry for the public places charter, which provides for signage of an establishment's smoking policy in five categories as follows: 1. no smoking, 2. smoking allowed throughout, 3. ventilated premises—smoking allowed throughout, 4. ventilated premises with separate area, 5. separate areas.
	This provides customers with information enabling them to choose between different establishments which offer reduced exposure to tobacco smoke.

Cannabis: Effect on Unborn Children

Lord Alton of Liverpool: asked Her Majesty's Government:
	What advice is being issued to women regarding the effect on unborn children of exposure to cannabis.

Baroness Andrews: A report prepared for the Department of Health by the National Addiction Centre, named Dangerousness of Drugs (September 2001), links the following dangers to cannabis: "Like tobacco, cannabis smoke is highly likely to be harmful to foetal development and should be avoided by pregnant women. Although there is a raft of studies suggesting that babies born to cannabis smoking mothers weigh less than the offspring of a control group and that children of cannabis smoking mothers may face developmental problems, the research thus far has been unable to untangle the effects of smoking and other factors from that of cannabis use per se".
	Copies of the report have been placed in the Library.

Passports

Lord Marlesford: asked Her Majesty's Government:
	Whether they will provide the number of British passports reported lost or stolen, respectively, in each of the last five years.

Lord Filkin: The United Kingdom (UKPS) Passport Service records information on passports reported lost, stolen or unavailable. In collating these figures no distinction is made between these categories. The information UKPS has recorded for the past five years is shown below:
	1998 31,497
	1999 62,364
	2000 114,624
	2001 148,230
	2002 166,358
	UKPS is introducing a comprehensive system for recording and disseminating information on lost, stolen and recovered passports. This system is due to go live in December of this year. It will enable the timely and accurate collection and dissemination of information on lost, stolen and recovered passports in the United Kingdom and in the Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) posts abroad. This information will improve our fraud prevention and detection capability and improve aspects of our customer service. The information held on this system will also be made available to the United Kingdom Immigration Service.

Passports

Lord Marlesford: asked Her Majesty's Government:
	What steps are taken by the Registrar General routinely to notify the Passport Agency of deaths; how many current British passports are in circulation; and how many have been returned to the authorities on the death of the holder in each of the past five years.

Lord Filkin: The United Kingdom Passport Service does not routinely receive notification of deaths from the Registrar General. The United Kingdom Passport Service has been seeking to establish arrangements to receive routine notification of deaths from government departments which hold such data. Discussions on this matter are on-going.
	It is estimated that there are 47 million valid British passports, equivalent to 80 per cent of the population. Every passport contains a reminder that it should be returned for cancellation on the death of the holder. The United Kingdom Passport Service has not routinely collated figures relating to the number of passports returned for cancellation on the death of the holder. Figures for passports cancelled in such circumstances are not therefore available for each of the past five years. However, figures are available for the period October 2000 to November 2001 and for the 2002 calendar year. These figures are shown below:
	
		
			   
			 October 2000–November 2001 33,786 
			 2002 41,032

Hull: Cautions and Convictions

Lord Laird: asked Her Majesty's Government:
	In the year ending 30 April 2002, what percentage of crimes notified to the police service in the policing area of Hull resulted in either a caution or a conviction; and how that compares with the average percentage for the rest of the United Kingdom.

Lord Falconer of Thoroton: The requested information is not available centrally. For the year ending March 2002, for Humberside, and England and Wales, the percentage ratios between the number of crimes for which there were cautions and convictions, and the number of recorded crimes, were 14.3 per cent and 16.9 per cent respectively. Cautions and convictions represent only part of the overall number of recorded crimes brought to justice, which include offences taken into consideration by the court. Cautions and convictions in one year may be for offences recorded in earlier years.
	In Scotland in the calendar year 2001, there were 421,093 recorded crimes, and 41,665 offenders against whom charges were proved. As the former figure relates to offences, and the latter to offenders, they cannot be directly compared to each other. Owing to the different legal systems, they also cannot be compared to figures for England and Wales; for example, there are no figures directly equivalent to cautions in Scotland.
	Caution and conviction figures for Northern Ireland for 2001 were not available.

National Firearms Licensing Management System

Baroness Anelay of St Johns: asked Her Majesty's Government:
	Further to the Answer by Lord Falconer of Thoroton on 25 March (HL Deb, col. 646), whether they will place in the Library of the House a copy of the invitation to tender for the national firearms licensing management system and a copy of the timetable for responses, scrutiny and award of a contract to deliver that system.

Lord Falconer of Thoroton: I am arranging for the timetable of proposed actions to be placed in the Library together with details of the high level award criteria. The actual invitation to tender is commercially confidential and cannot be made available in this way at present.

Firearms Amnesty: Forensic Examination

The Earl of Shrewsbury: asked Her Majesty's Government:
	What mechanisms they have put in place to ensure that those firearms which are surrendered to the police during the current amnesty will be collected centrally within police forces to facilitate examination by the Forensic Science Service for intelligence-gathering purposes.

Lord Falconer of Thoroton: Arrangements have been made for the police to refer weapons that they believe may have been used in crime to the Forensic Science Service (FSS) in the normal way. Police forces have also been asked to provide the Home Office with detailed information about what is handed in. This will be shared with the FSS and the National Criminal Intelligence Service (NCIS). Weapons of most interest to the FSS and NCIS will also be transferred to a single, central location in each police force area.
	The Association of Chief Police Officers does not believe, having regard to all of the above, that the cost and effort involved justifies the setting up of regional collection centres.